The green Island of Elephantine, which is about a mile in length, lies opposite Assûan and divides the Nile in two channels. The Libyan and Arabian deserts—smooth amber sand-slopes on the one hand; rugged granite cliffs on the other—come down to the brink on either side. On the Libyan shore a sheik’s tomb, on the Arabian shore a bold fragment of Moorish architecture with ruined arches open to the sky, crown two opposing heights, and keep watch over the gate of the cataract. Just under the Moorish ruin, and separated from the river by a slip of sandy beach, lies Assûan.
A few scattered houses, a line of blank wall, the top of a minaret, the dark mouths of one or two gloomy alleys, are all that one sees of the town from the mooring-place below. The black bowlders close against the shore, some of which are superbly hieroglyphed, glisten in the sun like polished jet.[46] The beach is crowded with bales of goods; with camels laden and unladen; with turbaned figures coming and going; with damaged cargo-boats lying up high and dry, and half heeled over, in the sun. Others, moored close together, are taking in or discharging cargo. A little apart from these lie some three or four dahabeeyahs flying English, American, and Belgian flags. Another has cast anchor over the way at Elephantine. Small rowboats cross and recross, meanwhile, from shore to shore; dogs bark; camels snort and snarl; donkeys bray; and clamorous curiosity dealers scream, chatter, hold their goods at arm’s length, battle and implore to come on board, and are only kept off the landing-plank by means of two big sticks in the hands of two stalwart sailors.
The things offered for sale at Assûan are altogether new and strange. Here are no scarabæi, no funerary statuettes, no bronze or porcelain gods, no relics of a past civilization; but, on the contrary, such objects as speak only of a rude and barbarous present—ostrich eggs and feathers, silver trinkets of rough Nubian workmanship, spears, bows, arrows, bucklers of rhinoceros hide, ivory bracelets, cut solid from the tusk, porcupine quills, baskets of stained and plaited reeds, gold nose rings and the like. One old woman has a Nubian lady’s dressing-case for sale—an uncouth, fetich-like object with a cushion for its body, and a top-knot of black feathers. The cushion contains two kohl-bottles, a bodkin and a bone comb.
But the noisest dealer of the lot is an impish boy blessed with the blackest skin and the shrillest voice ever brought together in one human being. His simple costume consists of a tattered shirt and a white cotton skull-cap; his stock in trade of a greasy leather fringe tied to the end of a stick. Flying from window to window of the saloon on the side next the shore, scrambling up the bows of a neighboring cargo-boat so as to attack us in the rear, thrusting his stick and fringe in our faces whichever way we turn, and pursuing us with eager cries of “Madame Nubia! Madame Nubia!” he skips and screams and grins like an ubiquitous goblin, and throws every competitor into the shade.
Having seen a similar fringe in the collection of a friend at home, I at once recognized in “Madame Nubia” one of those curious girdles, which, with the addition of a necklace and a few bracelets, form the entire wardrobe of little girls south of the cataract. They vary in size according to the age of the wearer; the largest being about twelve inches in depth and twenty-five in length. A few are ornamented with beads and small shells; but these are parures de luxe. The ordinary article is cheaply and unpretentiously trimmed with castor-oil. That is to say, the girdle when new is well soaked in the oil, which softens and darkens the leather, besides adding a perfume dear to native nostrils.
For to the Nubian, who grows his own plants and bruises his own berries, this odor is delicious. He reckons castor-oil among his greatest luxuries. He eats it as we eat butter. His wives saturate their plaited locks in it. His little girls perfume their fringes with it. His boys anoint their bodies with it. His home, his breath, his garments, his food are redolent of it. It pervades the very air in which he lives and has his being. Happy the European traveler who, while his lines are cast in Nubia, can train his degenerate nose to delight in the aroma of castor-oil!
The march of civilization is driving these fringes out of fashion on the frontier. At Assûan they are chiefly in demand among English and American visitors. Most people purchase a “Madame Nubia” for the entertainment of friends at home. L——, who is given to vanities in the way of dress, bought one so steeped in fragrance that it scented the Philæ for the rest of the voyage and retains its odor to this day.
Almost before the mooring-rope was made fast our painter, arrayed in a gorgeous keffiyeh[47] and armed with the indispensible visiting-cane, had sprung ashore and hastened to call upon the governor. A couple of hours later the governor (having promised to send at once for the sheik of the cataract and to forward our going by all means in his power) returned the visit. He brought with him the mudîr[48] and kadi[49] of Assûan, each attended by his pipe-bearer.
We received our guests with due ceremony in the saloon. The great men placed themselves on one of the side-divans, and the painter opened the conversation by offering them champagne, claret, port, sherry, curaçoa, brandy, whisky and Angostura bitters. Talhamy interpreted.
The governor laughed. He was a tall young man, graceful, lively, good-looking and black as a crow. The kadi and mudîr both elderly Arabs, yellow, wrinkled and precise, looked shocked at the mere mention of these unholy liquors. Somebody then proposed lemonade.